All present day optical disks used for CD-ROM, miniature ROM disk, video ROM disk, or other systems implementing optical disks require the use of push buttons or switches to perform control, library selection, or other information access functions. Push buttons as well as switches are comprised of mechanical contacts and are therefore subject to failure from metal fatigue, corrosion of the electrical contacting surfaces, and dirt buildup. For singular disk and especially for multiple disk systems, push buttons on the control apparatus, though allowing for programmable functions, do not provide a user friendly mechanism to change or access, for example, songs, videos, maps, or multimedia library information. Additionally, present day systems have no method for fast and simple access to all optical disk information through either an accompanying remote apparatus or on the system itself. Present day systems require the user to have specific knowledge of the location of the optical disk in the system as well as the location of the song, video, map, multimedia library, or other data stored on the optical disk. Automatic speech recognition technologies can provide solutions by alleviating the requirement for numerous mechanical switches and by allowing for direct information access through a more user friendly human interface; spoken words can be used to access corresponding information on optical disks.
In the automotive environment, automatic speech recognition technology can also play a crucial safety role. The user is no longer required to take his eyes off of the road to make song selections, access map information, or the like. For example, to access a song on a CD-ROM player, all the user would be required to do is to simply speak the name of the song that he wants to listen to.
Whether in a mobile environment or a home system, the lack of fast and simple access can be especially frustrating when using multiple optical disk platforms. For example, the trend for multiple CD platforms has been to accommodate increasing numbers of CDs. Today, some systems have as many as one hundred CDs or more and all systems require the user to have a knowledge of what CD-ROM disk the information is located on, where that particular CD-ROM disk is placed in the system, and where on the CD-ROM disk that the information is located. An enhancement for present optical disk systems is to use automatic speech recognition technology to overcome the disadvantages associated with the use of push buttons for accessing optical disk information. Present day CD-ROM disks do not have speech recognition templates. These templates are required for allowing the user immediate access to all disk information by simply speaking the title or a word representing the information to be selected.
A need has thus arisen for an optical disk access system that overcomes the disadvantages and inefficiencies associated with existing optical disks by providing automatic speech recognition templates as well as stored response messages on disk to allow for a more user friendly interface on systems that make use of this technology.